Prague’s property market has shown signs of recovery, including rising mortgage volumes.
Prague may be making a comeback as a hot property market, according to Brett Tudor on The MoveChannel. The country has spent the last ten years building a reputation as a sound investment location, and its performance has outstripped many other former communist bloc countries.
In some ways, Tudor writes, the Czech Republic’s communist past may have insulated it from the real estate craze of the 2000s:
While property price growth was certainly healthy prior to 2008, some of the spectacular price increases (or bubbles) seen in some of the other cities around Europe didn’t quite materialise to the extent they did elsewhere, it was more a case of steady growth backed up by a strong rental market, as demand from young professionals living and working in the city’s high tech industries continued to rise.
Net rents are up 8.4%, and mortgage volumes are also rising:
The main barometer for the strength of any property market is the availability of mortgage credit and here too we see positive signs, the volume of new mortgages has risen by 45% this year and affordability amongst the population of Prague is back to levels last seen in 2005.